There was a brief period of silence after their little talk about the academies and Chestnut's combat capabilities. It was awkward for sure, but neither party really had any idea how to continue from that point. Donovan personally felt more like he was in a doctor's office for a checkup than sitting in a meeting room to discuss the future of his species.
"Could you try circulating your split for me a little? Keeping it in your chest should be fine for the moment."
The tingling sensation that had extended to every corner of Don's body then retreated to the center of his body, though a strand still extended to where Chestnut's finger's were touching his hand.
"Does that mean you want me to move it out of my core?" The only reason he had ever been given permission to remove split from the core was in order to facilitate speech.
"Yes. So long as you keep the strand localized to your chest the dissipation should be kept to a minimum. I want you to make this strand as thick and strong as you possibly can, just to see what you are capable of."
"Yes Ma'am." Taking a moment to breathe, Donovan collected himself in both mind and body. As much as he had practiced manipulating split, he did not have much experience with keeping it under control outside of the core. He could really only maintain a thin thread to his throat for speaking, not much else.
"Just relax and do the best you can, I'll stop anything from going wrong. I just want to see what you can do, okay? There is no pressure here to prove yourself by doing something stupid." Chestnut could sense the tension building in Donovan's body despite his attempts to calm himself. She wanted to know where he was in the realm of split manipulation, not draw him into embarrassing himself.
Donovan didn't respond, he was too concentrated on not screwing up. Right now he was working on compressing a segment of the split in his core, spinning it in place while coaxing it into an elongated shape. Once this concentration reached the edge of his core it would form the base of the strand, the strand holding at that thickness and concentration assuming Donovan kept the 'head' moving at the proper speed and control.
His plan was to drag this strand on a circuit around his chest, going around the lungs before returning to the core. Hopefully, he wouldn't lose control. There were dangers associated with split running rampant, dangers the Arboreal Maiden had been very particular in warning the two of them about, but the primary concerns in this region of his body were damage to the lungs and heart. He could rest easy once he got the 'head' back to the core though, he could cut the supply of split to the 'tail' and the strand would naturally ramp down to nothingness.
"Whenever you are ready."
At her word, Donovan began to count down from three internally. Once he reached zero, he slammed that concentration of split against the wall of his core, his body tensing up in concentration. Holding his breath and flexing his core in an attempt to influence this dangerous and foreign power, he could feel that same tingling that Chestnut generated when she probed him to an extreme degree. This sensation started just behind his sternum, somewhere in the center of his chest, and at his direction made its way counterclockwise through his chest.
To assist in this, Donovan imagined one set of his ribs as something like a set of rails for the strand. He kept the strand right next to this rib, which was violently attempting to change direction even under his control.
This was probably the closest feeling he could imagine to riding a bucking bronco. He could really only affect which direction this strand was going, unable to damper its speed and unable to accurately predict where it would try to go next. It was a constant battle to keep it in line, but the visualization helped, it gave him a path to follow. The only issue he could foresee was that he wouldn't be accurate enough to make it hit his core again.
That would be problematic considering the amount of split he would have effectively just wasted, but that was something to be left to the Arboreal Maiden. His slightly more immediate concern was that he was running of breath. When Don inhaled he had expected this little strand to be a lot more compliant. With the 'head' only halfway around his body, right by his spine, Donovan was in the uncomfortable situation of becoming increasingly more light headed while having to concentrate desperately on a rampaging force inside of his body.
- - - - -
'He's really going for it isn't he?'
The Arboreal Maiden was keeping a very close watch on this strand's progression. It was shaking wildly, barely following a predetermined path, but it was moving at a reasonable pace for Donovan's level of skill. More than that, it was far more concentrated, far stronger, than she had anticipated. This, she had determined, was both a blessing and a curse for him.
'It isn't quite as strong as the strands most use to augment their own strength, but it's close. He'll still need a few more months before he can handle it.'
For only having roughly a month's worth of experience with split, Donovan had progressed at a frightening clip. Of course, the only real control groups she had to measure against were the average person, which was exposed to split from birth, and the Skwiven, who were fairly unique in terms of how they interacted with split. Of course she could always use herself as an example, but she felt that would be incredibly disingenuous. Her existence was an oddity, and could not be compared to an individual that was restricted to the traditional growth model for the time being.
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'I wonder how he is going to react to the information that he won't be able to fight on equal footing to his opponent for at least three months minimum. I doubt he would lash out, but I cannot imagine he will be happy about it, especially not once he understands just how much of a disadvantage he will be in.'
Chestnut had a feeling that Donovan knew he was at a disadvantage, however she wondered about how far behind Donovan realized he was. The duels in the Sanctum weren't anything like the fights he knew of, where a sufficient gap in tactics and knowledge of the battlefield could give him the win. All of them took place on level ground, starting a predetermined distance apart with no obstacles. Duels usually only lasted a few seconds after the first strike regardless of skill level or relative split strength differential, with any going over a minute being considered 'lengthy'.
These fights did not favor Donovan, at least not in his current state.
Terrans were, by nature, persistence predators. This she had learned both from countless years of observation and from reading their own medical analyses. In terms of survival strategy, this meant they were about as far from everyone else as possible, the vast majority of other human 'species' belonged to the ambush predator archetype, all others not being predators at all.
'Actually, that isn't quite true. There was another prominent group of endurance based humans, though I doubt their blood is pure enough at this point in time to have retained that trait.'
The Holifanians, that being the race not the followers of the religious doctrine or citizens of the Theocracy, could once be considered 'endurant' by the standards of the galaxy at large. They weren't at the level of the Terrans, but they were fairly close, and they used that endurance to great effect in their expansionist campaigns. They could hold a siege for longer than any other, even without the use of their 'modern' weaponry.
Of course, the Terrans would blow them out of the water when it actually came to reaching the important benchmarks of endurance. She could be fairly certain that the average Terran male could walk a further and longer than even the strongest Holifanians, though she had no way of checking, and there was little doubt in her mind that when it came to a knock-down drag-out contest of physical ability the Terrans would always come out on top. They were just built better for it as they didn't have split as a crutch.
Unfortunately there was a very good reason for split being as big of a selecting factor for evolution as it had always been. Split, particularly its ability to provide an incredible boost to an individual's strength for a short period of time, gave such an incredible advantage in a fight for survival that physical ability began to matter less and less. The downside was that this boost would only last as long as the amount of split someone had could sustain it. This, combined with the implications of one party in a fight for survival becoming far stronger for its (now much shorter) duration, meant that most of everything evolved to become more focused around winning, surviving, individual hostile encounters.
Traits like stealth, better sensory organs, faster reaction times, and most importantly maximum split efficiency were selected for over 'essentials' that would better support enduring in the wild. The end result being that the vast majority of living creatures focused on pumping out as much split as possible without necessarily caring about how much was left in reserve.
Once these humans 'conquered' the wild and began to form nations on their planets, they would eventually have wars between their clans/kingdoms/empires. She had seen this happen an uncountable number of times, and it always went the same way. These wars were never prolonged engagements, one or two battles were enough for most. The most infuriating part for her was that it was never the men at the bottom that determined the outcome, it was those of high pedigree and accordingly high strength with split.
The strong would fight, and the side whose 'nobility' came out on top would inevitably become the winners of the war. Everyone below their level of power couldn't compete. It was only a matter of time before these peoples would become united under a single family (or collection of bloodlines) that cultivated their power over generations through marriage with other strong blood, eventually coming to rule their entire planet. After that, the Oberlux would broach the veil and introduce this new race to the wider galaxy.
It was the same song and dance every - damn - time.
'It's becoming a little more unstable, but he should be able to make it back.'
The strand was already on its way back to his core, though there was a chance she would have to help him actually make contact.
'His problem is that he tries to keep it on track by pushing it when he should be pulling. . . did he not pick that up from when he learned to speak?'
The Arboreal Maiden set this problem aside in her head for the time being, chalking it up to a lack of genetic intuition. Surely he didn't understand the intricacies of split on an instinctual level.
Regardless, this spoke to the problems Donovan was bound to run into while he got used to it.
He was fundamentally not prepared for this. He did not have 'talent' for split. He had never experienced anything like this before, and he didn't really have the time to get used to it. Fortunately, this was something he seemed to have understood very well. She could tell that he hadn't skimped out on tempering his core.
If there were so many problems and complications associated with teaching these Terrans to utilize split, why was the Arboreal Maiden so desperate to teach them?
Simply saying that it was due to their endurance would be wrong. The mission required more than that. It required an individual whose capacity for split was unmatched by any other, but that in and of itself required the endurance they possessed. It also required their intelligence, their technology, their adaptability. Donovan's ability to grit his teeth and suffer through whatever was needed was definitely a desirable quality - even if it wasn't needed it opened a great many means by which they could catch up if he fell behind.
No, the Arboreal Maiden was desperate to strengthen them because she had been fighting this battle since time immemorial, against an enemy that could not be touched, seen, or sensed. The Arboreal Maiden and the Great Csillacra were fighting time itself.